The Deal
by Jedi L Mako
Summary: It's not easy making a living during the Civil War, especially for a world weary space pilot and her smart alec navigator. But it's time to get the goods and get paid, backstabbing or not.


The Deal  
  
**All these characters are mine, the setting belongs to George Lucas. No stealing**  
  
They met in the docking bay between her light freighter and his shuttle.  
  
"I thought you were coming alone."  
  
"Ric, he's just a kid. He won't breathe a word to anyone." She glanced over at the fifteen year old boy leaning against the battered freighter. His gray flight-suit streaked with oil and grease. His hands were stuffed in his pockets, dark hair hiding his eyes which were cast to the floor.  
  
"I told you to come alone."  
  
"He's my navigator, Ric. He's a good kid, smart too. Don't worry about him." Ric shot a weary glance over at the boy, who seemed to have no interest in what they were doing.  
  
"Alright, Vallen, but if anything gets out the price will be on your head."  
  
"Just give me the plans."  
  
"Ten-thousand credits.", he snapped.  
  
"What? I paid you already! Fifteen thousand in full and up front. We had a deal!"  
  
"You should know better than to trust me, Anya Vallen. You never learn, though, do yo..." His raspy voice cut off by the sizzle of his own searing flesh as a laser bolt burned into his chest. The kid by the freighter put his smoking blaster back in it's holster.  
  
"Appearances can be deceiving, eh Ric?" she scoffed as he dropped to the floor, clenching his mortal wound and cursing his stupidity. Anya turned to her young cohort. "Nice shot, Dodge."  
  
"Aren't you glad I'm on your side."  
  
"Don't get cocky now, kid. Just remember who taught you how to fire that thing." Dodger grinned and walked over to her. Anya stooped down to search, the now dead, Ric. She found what she was looking for in his jacket. Removing the small data pad from his inside pocket and placing it into the chest pocket of her olive green flight suit.  
  
"I told you he was trouble." Dodger said. He nudged Ric's body with his boot. Anya brushed a few strands of her platinum blonde hair away from her face.  
  
"Kid, eveyone's trouble. And as long as you remember that, you'll never get double crossed." She smirked at Ric and his foolishness, then motioned to her ship.  
  
"Go start her up, Dodge, and set course. I'm gonna see if our friend Ric, here, has anything else of value that we could use."  
  
" Good idea, where should I set the nav-computer for as destination?"  
  
"Arista 2, Ilford system. The sooner we get these plans to the Rebel leaders, the sooner we get our reward." Dodger smiled and ran over to the freighter. After lowering the gang plank he climbed inside. Anya once again searched Ric's body. Locating his shuttle's remote she hacked her way into the ship's main computer. The shuttle's main cargo doors hissed open.  
  
"Bingo."  
  
Inside the dilapidated ship was a virtual wasteland of scrap parts.  
  
"There's nothing here worth taking." She thought rummaging through the junk. " I should have suspected as much from a low life like Ric." The cargo hold shook as the engines of her freighter warmed up. She exited the shuttle. Glancing, once more, to Ric's body she turned to her ship. But before she took a step she saw a shimmmer of orange in the reflective steel paneled floor. In a flash she pulled her blaster out of her flight suit and fired three times into the rafters of the docking bay. A man clad in orange body armor plummited to the floor, plasma gun in hand. She grabbed the weapon from him and stuck it in his face.  
  
"Who sent you?" she demanded. The man glared at her then looked at the gaping wound in his left leg where the blaster fire had gotten him. He lowered his eyes in defeat.  
  
"If I tell you he'll kill me and if I don't you'll kill me. I'd rather die an honorable death." he muttered.  
  
"A bounty hunter never dies honorably." She pulled the trigger before he could respond. Leaving the smoldering corpse behind she boarded her ship. She joined Dodger in the cockpit.  
  
"Where'd you get the plasma gun?" he said eyeing the weapon.  
  
"Ran into a bounty hunter."  
  
"Already?"  
  
"Oh, I doubt it's in relation to this." she patted her chest pocket "I mean, has there ever been a time a bounty hunter wasn't on our tails?" Dodger grinned, thinking of previous bounty hunters that had met their match with Anya. "Besides..." Anya continued, "they're just after the same thing we are."  
  
"What? The plans?"  
  
"Nope. Credits." she smirked. Taking her seat in the pilots chair, she pushed the throttle bar forward. "Now...off to Arista 2." The freighter eased out of the docking bay then dissapeared into the stars as the hyperdrive kicked in. 


End file.
